People who are using Microsoft Outlook must hear about appointments and meetings but often get confused and surely many of them even do not understand what is an appointment and what is a meeting. What is the difference between an appointment and meeting in Outlook? If you are also searching for the same then I might say your search came to an end. In this article, I will tell you about both appointments and meetings.
Appointment in Outlook
What is an appointment in Outlook?
An appointment is a scheduled activity in your Outlook calendar that does not involve other people. You do not need to invite other people to attend with you. It is only reflected on your calendar. It shows your daily activities and your tasks. One can find your free and busy times when he sees your appointment list in your calendar if it is shared with them.
Read More: Outlook To Do list boost your productivity
What is the purpose of the appointment?
The basic purpose of an appointment is to track your daily activities in your calendar. If you have any target, challenge, or task that need to complete in a scheduled time you can create an appointment in your callender. Besides these, If you have any activities that need to be done every day or every week in a specific time you can create an appointment in your callendar. Appointment will remind you for the activities with alarm.
Can other people see my appointments in Outlook?
If you are using Microsoft Exchange, Microsoft 365 or Outlook.com account you can send sharing invitation to other people to view your calendar depending upon your permission. For a project if you create an additional calendar for your team and invite them they can view your calendar appointments.
Dont worry if you are not using Microsoft Exchange account, Microsoft 365 or Outlook.com still you can share your callendar via email. But in that case, your reciepients will not have any update of your appointments.
How do I create appointments in Outlook?
To create an appointment in Outlook is very simple. Follow the instruction below.
- Go to the Navigation panel and select the Calendar.
- Select New Appointment or Press keyboard shortcut Ctrl + N on your keyboard.
- Enter your appointment subject, location, start time and end time. if you do not enter time outlook will automatically fix half an hour.
- Click Save & Close to complete the task.
Why are appointments so important?
- Appointment organizes your activity.
- No chance to miss any scheduled activities if you add it in your appointment.
- You can make a weekly plan when you use appointment in your calendar.
- Other people can see your free, busy time, or out of office when you share your calendar.
- It increases your productivity level on step ahead.
Learn More: How to sync google calendar with Outlook
Can you change an outlook appointment to a meeting?
Yes, you can change an outlook appointment to a meeting. Just add other people to your appointment. Your appointment will be changed to a meeting.
Meeting in Outlook
A meeting in Outlook is an activiy that involve other people and resources like meeting room etc. When you are creating a meeting it reflects not only in your calendar but also those people whom you are involving to. To create a meeting in Outlook you have to mention subject, start time, end time and location of the meeting. When you click the send button it will send a meeting request to all reciepients to accept them or reject.
What is the purpose of a meeting?
The purpose of a meeting can be official internal such as project update, issue resolution, reporting to manager, taking reports from you subordinates, follow up project activities, etc. Meeting purpose can be external also like receiving project update from subcontractor, report submission to clients, regular meeting with supplier, etc.
How to create a meeting
- Go to the Navigation panel and select Calendar.
- From the ribbon, click on New Meeting.
- Add people in the To field, add a subject line, start time, end time, and location.
- Click Send button to send an invitation for the meeting.
Learn More: How to schedule a meeting in Outlook?
Can you schedule a meeting in Outlook without inviting yourself?
You can schedule a meeting with other people, maybe your senior can ask you to schedule a meeting with someone else. In that case what will happen as you are calling that meeting your address will be on the list but you do not need to attend that meeting. It is very simple.
How to cancel a meeting
As meeting is an activity that involve other people, if you are the organizer and think that meeting is not required you should cancel the meeting. Otherwise, those people who are invited will fix their time to attend meeting with you.
The process of deleting or cenceling meeting is very simple, you can do it with a single click.
- Go to the Navigation panel and select the Calendar.
- Double-click the meeting to open it.
- From the ribbon, click Cancel Meeting.
- Click Send Cancelation to inform everyone.
Difference between appointment and meeting in Outlook
Many people using Outlook for a long time but do not understand the terms appointment and meeting. If you already read the above article hopefully you understood what is an appointment and what is a meeting in Microsoft Outlook.
An appointment involves only you, it is reflected on your outlook calendar only. On the other hand, a meeting is an activity that involves other people who are invited through the meeting feature.
An appointment can be your day-long activity but a meeting is a group activity with a certain agenda in a specific location at a certain time.
An appointment shows your daily free time, busy time, or out-of-office status to your colleague but a meeting is organized with a group of people with a certain aim.
I hope, the article on the difference between appointment and meeting in Outlook is helpful to you. Please feel free to post a comment in the comment box if you need any help from us in this regard. Thank you very much.
